There’s just no scrubbing dawn clean enough
to heal last night, or the night before; no
muscling gray into motives, wine back into
the bottle, its shattering into an intact object
passed between hands to warm them.

×

I never knew words could be coffins.
Or I did but didn’t care. Which of us
is boxed up & ready for forever
depends on whose eyes you’re looking
through, whose story you believe,
the minor movements of a body
unasleep on a shared mattress.

×

Forgive me. That I cannot stop ash
from building back into flame. That
my mouth pressed to the burn is not
a kiss. In time, how marks move in-
ward. Now that the paint has worn
off, that I don’t love this house quite
enough to undo the damage. Once, I think,
we were held together by more than
spit & sky.

×

But pain is just handing the body
back to itself. Love: the same.
& perhaps we can learn to make
each other’s weight satisfying again.

×

Mattress bare, stained as a sky
before or just after storm.
& each new bruise is the same.
Are we merely shadows
among shadows to each other?
An apology in the making?
Old blood caked on an old blade.

Author of the article

John Sibley Williams is the author of nine poetry collections, most recently Disinheritance. An eleven-time Pushcart nominee and winner of various awards, John serves as editor of The Inflectionist Review. Previous publications include: Yale Review, Atlanta Review, and Prairie Schooner.